Be brave enough to start a blog, having no idea how in the world anyone will ever find it. Even if you think you might not want anyone to find it, because you’re still not fully comfortable with the idea of sharing your inner thoughts with strangers.

Be brave and know that even though what you write today is indelible, it is not a permanent expression of you, just a captured expression of the way you were at that moment in time.

Be brave enough to believe that what you have to say is valuable. For that matter, be brave enough to believe that you will have something to say at all.

Be brave enough to speak, knowing that not all will agree with you, that some may disparage you and try to tear you down.

Be brave because there is no way to write and publish a novel which (hopefully) people will buy and read without first having the courage to put yourself on a page and be okay with opening up to others around you.

Have you ever been afraid of showing a part of yourself to someone? I am.

I will admit it freely – over the past several weeks… months… years… of my life, I have been afraid. To speak. To write. To bare a piece of my soul for consumption and viewing by anyone who happens to wander in to this blog.

But I want to write. Feel called to write. I have ideas in my head that bounce around and pester me UNTIL I WRITE THEM DOWN. They will not relent. And every day, a voice in my mind whispers, “You’re losing out on an important piece of your life by not doing what moves you.” And by not sharing it. I don’t want my work to end up tossed in a pile in the back of my closet, filed away in a cabinet or tucked into some dusty box. I want to share it. My hope is that it will move others instead of only me.

I love the quote: “Courage is not the absence of fear, but rather the judgment that something else is more important than fear.” (Ambrose Hollingworth Redmoon, a.k.a. James Neil Hollingworth)